Cisco Network Consultants

Cisco is a perennial leader in delivering state-of-the-art firewalls for the broadest possible variety of environments. Cisco's Firepower NGFWs Firewalls provide a modern firewall platform that combines sophisticated hardware, cloud-based services, and machine learning to block, discover, and mitigate threats automatically. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE-certified firewall experts can help your organization to design and execute a smooth migration to Cisco Firepower firewalls from Cisco's from ASA 5500-X, ASA 5500, or PIX appliances and show you how to integrate Firepower firewalls with Cisco's cloud-based services to create and centrally manage IT ecosystems that include branch offices, data centers, and cloud resources. Progent can also assist you to manage and debug older-generation Cisco firewalls. Progent's certified cybersecurity experts can assist you with policy creation based on leading best practices in order to build a consistent and effective cybersecurity posture across all your networked devices at any location.

Cisco's Firepower NGFW Firewalls
Cisco's Firepower Next Generation Firewalls (NGFWs) provide a major performance boost over Cisco's previous-generation ASA 5500-X security appliances and offer unified management and automation of modern cybersecurity features such as application visibility and control (AVC), next-generation intrusion protection with intelligent prioritization of risks, advanced malware protection, URL filtering, and sandboxing. For more information about Cisco's Firepower portfolio of NGFWs Firewalls, visit Firepower Series firewalls integration services.

Cisco's ASA 5500-X Series and Legacy Firewalls
Cisco's ASA 5500-X Series, ASA 5500, and PIX firewall appliances offer combined firewall, IPsec VPN, and intrusion prevention system (IPS) capabilities in single-box packages, delivering a wide array of features to match the security needs of companies from small and mid-size businesses to enterprises and Internet service providers. Cisco's ASA 5500-X, ASA 5500, and PIX firewall appliances allow network security teams to protect their network edge and provide secure offsite and mobile connectivity while using powerful management mechanisms built on Cisco's industry-leading firewall technology.

Cisco's ASA 5500 Series and PIX firewall appliances have reached end-of-life but are still widely deployed in small and mid-size organizations and in some larger networks. The ASA 5500-X Series Next-Generation Firewalls represent substantially more value and have superseded Cisco's ASA 5500 and PIX families of firewalls for new deployments. However, Cisco's legacy firewalls, if carefully managed, can offer a high level of protection by providing multiple services including stateful firewall, VPN tunneling, and IPS.

Since Cisco's acquisition of Sourcefire, the whole family of ASA 5500-X devices can be provisioned to support Firepower Services, built on Sourcefire's Snort technology, which is the market's most deployed network intrusion protection system (IPS). Firepower services provide powerful new capabilities including advanced malware protection (AMP), URL filtering, dynamic threat analytics, and automation.

Progent's Cisco-certified infrastructure engineers can assist you to maintain and debug legacy ASA 5500 and PIX firewalls and can also assist you to design and carry out a smooth migration to Cisco's ASA 5500-X Series firewalls with Firepower Services. Progent can also assist you to design, configure, tune, administer and debug new firewall ecosystems built on Cisco's current ASA 5500-X firewalls with Firepower. Progent can also assist you to upgrade from your Cisco ASA 5500-X Series solution to Cisco's latest Firepower Next Generation Firewalls.

Cisco's ASA 5500-X Firewall Product Family
Cisco's comprehensive line of ASA 5500-X security appliances features an enhanced replacement for every rack-mountable unit in the previous ASA 5500 series of devices. Each ASA 5500-X firewall targets the same market as the corresponding earlier models, which gives most plenty of choice for picking a solution that aligns with their security needs and budgets. All ASA 5500-X firewalls build on Cisco's proven stateful-inspection firewall technology and all incorporate purpose-built 64-bit hardware with multicore processors and support Cisco's powerful protection services. All devices in Cisco's ASA 5500-X product line deliver consistent security across any mix of physical, virtual, and cloud environments.

For additional information about Cisco's ASA 5500-X firewalls, Cisco Firepower services, and Progent's consulting for ASA security appliances, go to Firepower configuration and debugging consulting

Cisco's Firepower Services for ASA 5500-X Security Appliances
Cisco ASA 5500-X firewalls work with software or hardware modules that support Cisco's Firepower Services, which provide layered protection against advanced threats. Firepower Services are powered by innovative technology adopted by Cisco from Sourcefire. Key features of Firepower Services for ASA security appliances include:

• Layered protection against both familiar and new attacks
• Cisco's Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) that uses big data to discover and remediate intrusions
• Cisco's Next-Generation Intrusion Prevention System (NGIPS) that performs contextual analysis that covers users, infrastructure, apps, and content to discover attacks that incorporate multiple approaches
• Fine-grained Application Visibility and Control that is familiar with thousands of applications and can automatically launch standard and customized IPS policies based on the degree of threats

Simpler deployments of ASA firewalls can be effectively administered using Cisco's on-device Adaptive Security Device Manager (ASDM) Adaptive Security Device Manager, a web utility included with all ASA 5500-X models. ASDM provides a simple web dashboard for configuring, administering, and debugging ASA 5500-X firewalls and service modules.

For multi-device and multi-site deployments, ASA 5500-X appliances with Firepower can be managed using Cisco's Firepower Management Center, implemented as one or several physical units or virtual devices. Firepower Management Center provides unified firewall management, Application Visibility and Control (AVC, enhanced IPS, URL filtering, and Cisco's Advanced Malware Protection. Because of frequent rebranding since Cisco's acquisition of Sourcefire Defense Center, Firepower Management Center has been offered under various names that include Cisco Defense Center, FireSIGHT Defense Center, and Cisco Firesight Management Center.

Cisco's Firepower Management Center provides features unavailable with Cisco's on-box Adaptive Security Device Manager tool. Extra features include expanded context awareness, Cisco's Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) with remediation for client devices, a dashboard that provides real-time infrastructure visualization, automated policy tuning driven by risk assessment of threats, advanced IPS, custom app discovery for Application Visibility and Control, customized health notifications, enhanced reporting options, and application interfaces for host input and databases. Hardware-dependent capabilities like clustering, stacking, switching, routing, VPN, and NAT must be managed via Cisco's ASA 5500-X on-box ASDM or the ASA 5500-X CLI.

Cisco ASA 5500 Family of Adaptive Security Appliances
Cisco ASA 5500 Series Firewalls build on engineering behind the Cisco PIX 500 firewall, the IPS 4200 family Intrusion Prevention System, and Cisco's VPN 3000 model concentrator. These solutions enable the Cisco ASA Firewall product line to deliver a firewall that defends against the broadest variety of threats. Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances Firewalls deliver program protection, local containment, and clean Virtual Private Network connectivity across the entire product line. This broad scope of security enables the guarding of any network section, including the most common attack vectors such as remote locations, LAN-attached internal users, and remote access Virtual Private Networks.

Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances (ASA) firewalls provide robust application protection through smart, application-aware inspection processes that analyze network flows at Layers 4-7. The result is a more secure network covering Web, voice, and mobile wireless services. To defend networks against application-layer attacks and to offer better policing of the applications and protocols used in their networks, these inspection engines integrate broad application and protocol knowledgebases and rely on protection enforcement technologies that include anomaly sensing and application and protocol state monitoring. Also incorporated are attack detection and remediation technology including application/protocol command filters and URL deobfuscation. Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances 5500 Series firewall inspection engines also provide control over instant messaging and peer-to-peer file sharing, enabling organizations to police usage policies and recover bandwidth for critical business applications.

For more information about Progent's consulting services for ASA 5500 firewalls, visit Cisco ASA 5500 firewalls integration and debugging consulting.

Cisco PIX Security Appliance Series
Based upon a hardened, specialized operating system that offers rich protection features, Cisco PIX firewall appliances offer excellent security and have received Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 4 status and ICSA Labs Firewall and IP Security (IPsec) certification. Cisco PIX firewall appliances provide security for a wide array of Voice over IP and additional multimedia standards such as H.323 v. 4, SIP, Cisco Skinny Client Control Protocol, Real-Time Streaming Protocol, and Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP), enabling organizations to protect deployments of a wide array of contemporary and next-generation IP voice and multimedia applications.

Administrators can furthermore remotely set up, monitor, and troubleshoot PIX firewall appliances using a command-line interface. Safe CLI interface access is available through a number of techniques including Secure Shell (SSHv2) Protocol, Telnet over IP Security, and out-of-band through a console port. Cisco PIX firewall appliances also include dependable auto-update capabilities, a set of advanced protected remote-administration services that make sure that firewall configurations and software images are always current.

For additional information about Progent's support services for PIX 500 security appliances, go to PIX firewalls configuration and troubleshooting services.

Progent's Migration Consulting Support for Cisco Firewalls
Because Cisco has ceased offering the PIX and ASA 5500 families of firewalls, many businesses are uncomfortable with relying on a critical infrastructure mechanism that may no longer be supported. Cisco ASA 5500-X and Firepower Series security appliances have the benefit of being new products and also offer a number of technical and budgetary benefits in comparison to PIX 500 firewalls. These advantages include significantly better performance, optional SSL tunneling capability, and a modular architecture that guards your investment by allowing you to self-install more security features when and if you need them. Progent's Cisco certified experts can help your company to determine the business case for moving from PIX or Cisco ASA 5500 firewalls, design a migration plan that allows for a quick and non-disruptive upgrade, help you to configure new ASA 5500-x or Firepower NGFW Series firewalls, and provide remote training, consulting, and technical support services.

Other Ways Progent Can Help You with Cisco ASA and PIX Firewalls
Cisco's Firepower NGFW Series, ASA Series, and PIX family firewalls provide a wealth of setup, monitoring, and troubleshooting features which give you the ability to configure these firewalls to match your business needs. Progent's CCIE authorized network consultants can help you to build an efficient infrastructure that incorporates Cisco firewall technology and that provides advanced protection, fault tolerance, performance, and recoverability. Progent's GISA and CISSP-ISSP-premier information security experts can assist you to create a security strategy appropriate for your business and can configure your security appliance to enforce your security policies. Progent's risk evaluation experts can evaluate the strength of your current firewall solution and validate the security of your entire information system network. Progent's Technical Response Center (TRC) can deliver urgent online troubleshooting for Cisco technology and can give you quick access to a Cisco CCIE expert.

To find out additional details about Progent's consulting support for Cisco solutions, choose a subject:

• Overview of Progent's Cisco Network Support
• Timely Remote Support from a CCIE Consultant
• Cisco Routers Consulting Services
• Cisco Wireless Deployment Services
• Cisco Aironet APs Deployment Services
• Cisco Small Business WiFi Access Points Consulting Support
• Cisco Catalyst Wi-Fi 6/6E Wireless Access Points Solution Design, Configuration and Debugging Expertise
• Cisco Wireless Controllers Integration Consulting
• Cisco Meraki APs Deployment Services
• Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM or Unified CM) and CallManager Integration and Technical Support
• Cisco VoIP Phones and IP Video Desktop Phones Expertise and Cisco Wireless VoIP Phone Solutions
• Cisco Jabber Integration Services
• Cisco Catalyst Switches Engineering Expertise
• Cisco VPN and Network Security Setup and Troubleshooting Support
• SIP and CUBE Integration Solutions: SIP Trunking and CUBE Integration Expertise
• Cisco Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services for an at-home workforce
• Design Solutions for Cisco-powered Data Centers
• Infrastructure Optimization Services for Internet Service Providers
• Remote Management Technologies for Cisco-powered Environments

Integration of Cisco and Third-party Security Technology
Progent offers expertise in firewall and VPN products from all major vendors and can help you integrate Cisco technology with additional security solutions to help you build a cost-effective network infrastructure that provides a level of security and flexibility appropriate for your business. Third-party firewall and VPN support services available from Progent include:

• Check Point Software Consulting
• Watchguard Consulting
• Juniper Networks NetScreen and SSG Firewall Consulting
• SonicWall Consulting
• Symantec Raptor Consulting

To get in touch with Progent about engineering help for Cisco products, phone 1-800-993-9400 or refer to Contact Progent.